醫護人員是重要的醫療資源,在漸趨高齡化的社會,醫療人力的資源與配置是政府醫療政策規劃的重要的課題。本研究將承載力的觀點應用在資料包絡分析法 (DEA) 去探討在臺灣各縣市所擁有的人口、經濟與政府醫療保健支出這些資源下,臺灣22個縣市醫護人員的目標數量。本研究使用Tone (2001) 之產出導向的差額變數模型,以2013年至2017年的統計資料進行分析,算出各縣市醫護人員的目標數量、承載達標率、差額數與應增加比率,以目標設定的角度分析各縣市的醫護人員數如何調整。實證結果顯示:(1) 臺灣護理人員的承載達標率比醫師低。(2) 離島地區的醫護人員嚴重不足。 (3) 臺灣大部分的縣市需要且能夠承載比現有更多的醫護人員。醫護人員無效率的分布對醫療品質有不利的影響,政府可參考本研究結果,增加醫護人員承載達標率較低縣市的醫療資源,並傳達各縣市醫護人員承載力的資訊,鼓勵醫療人員去承載達標率較低的縣市開業,提升醫護人力資源分布的效率。
Physicians and nurses are the key personnel in health care. How to distribute health workforce appropriately is a crucial issue to an aging society. This study applies the theory of carrying capacity to explore target quantities of physicians and nurses in Taiwan under Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA). Tone’s (2001) slack-based model is applied to compute target quantities, achievement ratio, slack and adjustment ratio of physicians and nurses in Taiwan’s administrative regions during 2013-2017. The main findings are as follows: (1) Achievement ratio of nurses is lower than physicians. Inefficient distribution of nurses is more serious in regions of Taiwan. (2) Outlying islands are shortage of physicians and nurses. (3) Most cities and counties in Taiwan need more physicians and nurses. In order to improve efficiency of health human resource distribution, the government should not only increase medical manpower in regions with lower achievement ratio but also encourage medical practitioners to go to these regions.